My Dove Family

I got the parents off Craigslist for $20 for the pair. this was their first hatch. It was two eggs but one egg had a small crack and didn't develop so I took the other egg out and stuck it in the bator with the chicken eggs i was hatching. The day before hatch day I stuck it back underneath mom and both have been taking great care of this little one. the baby dove is exactly 15 days old today.

This is the baby when it was first born.

Do dove parents normally groom their babies? I notice that the parents seem to pick through the baby's feathers - doesn't seem to be hurting it because it doesn't move away...

You can't tell the sex until they are old enough to start acting male or female unless you breed sex-linked colors (which you haven't). Why did you take the egg and hatch it yourself instead of allowing them to hatch it? I can't believe the baby is already leaving the nest at 15 days! My baby is almost 4 weeks old and just left the nest a few days ago!

It hatched March 26th, a Saturday, so the day I posted it was actually, 16 days. I marked the date down on the calendar. Couldn't forget that date since my chicken eggs hatched the day before, on the 25th....so no, it's not over three weeks old.

She isn't lying about the age. That looks about right for a 16 day old dove. I'm guessing the feathers under the wings were not opened up yet. They grow very quickly at first but they don't fully wean until 3-4 weeks old. The reason this one left the nest so early is because it is easy for it to. The nest is right there. But it is still going to get fed by the parents for a while.